5 Sci-Fi Medical Procedures We'll Have in Our Lifetime

Every conversation about health care these days is about the skyrocketing cost, and how we're going to pay for it and what the government should do about it. But in the middle of that conversation, we kind of lose track of the fact that downright jaw-dropping advances are being made every day. That's one reason the stuff costs so much, after all.

So let's at least take a moment to marvel at the fact that we're not too far away from having ...

#5. Memory Deletion

The Problem:

It's a compelling enough idea that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind built its entire plot around it: selecting and erasing certain memories from the human brain.

After all, we all have a skeleton or two in our closet, and an idiocy or two thousand in our past that we'd like to just wipe off the record. Wouldn't you, if given the chance, choose to erase from your mind that one time in eighth grade that you got hammered on spiked punch and tried to grope your math teacher on the dance floor?

GettyOne boy's drunken error was the greatest night of Mr. Jameson's life.

The Sci-Fi Solution:

Well, soon you can! Science has been tinkering with the memory parts of the human brain for quite some time, for reasons that range from potential military applications to curing Alzheimer's disease to "because they can." In fact, some successful lab tests on memory alteration have already been made.

Getty"We found our car keys! Thank you, science!"

"But Cracked," you say, "surely that means nothing? Some wacky doctors playing with lab rats are light years away from any actual, tangible results on humans." Good thing, then, that one Dr. Merel Kindt and her team from Amsterdam University -- Amsterdam having no shortage of people with memories of the "Oh fuck, what did I do last night?" variety -- have already performed memory drug tests on human subjects.

Their project has dealt exclusively with dampening bad memories. Naturally, scientists being scientists, they first artificially created said memories with a slightly serial killer-y method of electric shocks and pictures of spiders, but still -- they managed to tamper that very specific fear-memory back into obscurity, so it's probably OK.

Getty"What a curious little creat- OH MY GOD, IT'S GOT MY HAND!"

It is, by the way, worth noting that most every scientist with some degree of know-how on the subject says the memory alteration process can be used for both erasing and enhancing memories. And they have been dealing exclusively with shitty memories. Keep that in mind when you place your bets on whether Dr. Kindt is on the receiving end of a Nobel Prize or if we're witnessing the origin story of the real life version of Scarecrow here.

#4. A Gun That Heals You

The Problem:

Skin. The largest organ of the human body, the protective layer that both shelters the raw, sausage-like horror movie monster that lurks within and covers it to be at least somewhat presentable. And rarely are you more screwed than when your skin takes so much damage that it can't heal -- burns induced by fire and chemicals can easily mess us up beyond the point of recovery.

At that point, a patient's only option is usually skin grafting, where they basically take some skin from your thigh or, indeed, ass, and sew it right the hell onto the part of you that got burned. It's a difficult process with a healing time of many weeks, but hey, what can you do? It's not like we have magical healing guns like the medics in Team Fortress 2.

Meet the skin gun, a gun that shoots regeneration. Literally -- when you pull the trigger, it shoots liquid skin solution on you, harvested from a sample of your own healthy skin. The process takes a mere 90 minutes -- in a couple of days, the new skin settles in and you're good to go.

The researchers don't consider the gun to be ready yet. It's not a failure or anything -- the skin it makes is just fine -- it's just that they have bigger things in mind. Yes, their goal is to make the gun regrow everything, from hair to muscle tissue to organs. Because after you've managed to build a goddamn gun that heals, reasonable aspirations just cease to be a thing anymore.

#3. The Anti-Depression Magnet

The Problem:

Depression and the various ailments that spring from it are the scourge of modern society. Sure, most of us get the blues every now and again, but when things really go off the rails, that shit goes clinical. Clinical depression is a dead serious thing that goes way beyond listening to shitty country ballads and sulking, deeply affecting the life of the person and likely everyone they're close to.

And here's the problem: Depression is a bitch to treat. Even in fictional universes where they have beams that instantly heal wounds, they'd never depict some kind of invisible depression-curing ray that they could just shoot at your brain.

Photos.comDepression: Cured.

The Sci-Fi Solution:

Well, here it is:

Via Gajitz.comNothing treats depression like a dentist's chair attached to a bewildering array of soulless machines.

The secret is magnets, and we're not talking about the pseudoscience bullshit magnetic bracelets that are intended to cure your arthritis. This is no placebo, this is transcranial magnetic stimulation, where a patient's head is exposed to a powerful electromagnet that stimulates the mood-controlling areas of the brain. The principle isn't that much different from electroshock therapy, only without the electrodes and without so many patients running away screaming at the mention of it.

Photos.com"You take the treatment or we will beat the fucking depression out of you!"